The National Institutes of Health has awarded the University of Alabama at Birmingham a seven-year, $15.6 million grant to investigate the screening of newborns for a common infection known as cytomegalovirus, or CMV.

The national, multi-site study is funded by the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders.

Dr. Suresh Boppana, an associate professor of pediatrics and co-principal investigator of the UAB study, says the often "silent" infection is a leading cause of hearing loss in children.

"Our study will further investigate the link between CMV and hearing loss in children and will evaluate the feasibility of screening newborns for CMV infection," Boppana says.

Although the virus typically poses no threat to healthy children and adults, CMV can lead to serious health problems in unborn babies and people with weakened immune systems.

Karen Fowler, a UAB research associate professor and co-principal investigator for the project, says roughly 40,000 infants nationwide are born with CMV, and as many as 15 percent of those infants develop "significant health problems, most often hearing problems, as a result of the infection."

Although most states require infants to undergo hearing tests before they leave the nursery, CMV-related hearing problems may not be present at birth.

"Newborn CMV screening would help us identify children at risk for developing hearing problems as a result of the virus," Boppana says.

The study will be conducted in three phases. The first focuses on protocol approval so recruitment may begin. The second phase, scheduled to begin later this year, will involve enlisting newborns for the research and determination of the best method of screening them. In phase three, scheduled to begin next year, more than 100,000 newborns will be screened and scheduled for follow-up study.

Other participating institutions are as follows: University of Mississippi, Jackson campus; Carolinas Medical Center, Charlotte, N.C.; St. Peter's University Medical Center, New Brunswick, N.J.; University of Cincinnati and Cincinnati Children's Medical Center; University of Pittsburgh and Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh; and University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas.